Though the NWSL hit the pause button this week, players worldwide are still on the move, as both European and US soccer teams use the midseason break to sharpen their lineups with international signings.
The NWSL has already seen one major departure, with the San Diego Wave announcing Monday that forward María Sánchez will return to her former Liga MX club UANL Tigres after nearly five years in the NWSL, with the Wave set to receive an undisclosed transfer fee in return.
"When the opportunity came to return to Tigres, I had to do a lot of inner searching, and I ultimately decided that returning to Liga MX Femenil and Tigres specifically was the best course of action for my career," the 29-year-old dual citizen and Mexico international player said in the Wave's release.
NWSL clubs are also setting their sights on European free agents, with the Washington Spirit bringing in Juventus forward Sofia Cantore last week — the first Italian signing in league history.
Also hopping aboard the player transaction carousel is new WSL side London City, with the top-flight debutantes inking OL Lyonnes midfielder and Dutch international Daniëlle van de Donk on Friday.
Meanwhile, van de Donk's wife and club teammate Ellie Carpenter is also potentially WSL-bound, with the defender reportedly nearing a deal that would see the Australian join Chelsea FC in return for the Blues sending Canadian international Ashley Lawrence to OL Lyonnes.
For their part, OL Lyonnes picked up defender Ingrid Engen from Barcelona as a free agent last week, adding the Norwegian international after snagging French forward and PSG's all-time leading scorer Marie-Antoinette Katoto earlier this month.
With the most recent NWSL CBA abolishing traditional trade windows, expect even more international signings and roster reshufflings before the league resumes play on August 1st.
A report released by analytics company Nielsen Sports and beverage corporation PepsiCo this week indicates that women's soccer is on track to amass upward of 800 million fans by 2030 — eventually making it the fifth largest sport in the world.
Nielsen estimates that women's soccer currently has the world's 10th biggest fanbase, but the study's prediction of a 38% increase in reach over the next five years would have the sport eventually rivaling top spectator draws like pro tennis and Formula One.
Already a powerhouse in the US, the rise of the European women's game has been particularly significant.
For example, the UK-hosted 2022 Euro saw fan interest in the women's game double in England, with that growth beginning well before the Lionesses' historic title win.
The report also notes that women's soccer still lags behind in terms of corporate sponsorship, highlighting increased opportunities for brands as the fanbase expands.
"We see women's football as more than just a sport," said PepsiCo EVP and chief marketing and growth officer Jane Wakely. "It's a cultural force with the power to connect, inspire and grow our brands."
"From media rights to sponsorship and fan engagement, this is no longer a case of future promise but present value," said Nielsen Sports head of international Samantha Lamberti.
Ultimately, the current trajectory of women's soccer is seeing the sport carve out a more powerful place in the global market — so long as investors also see the vision.
"We have long believed in the potential of women's football," added Lamberti. "Today, we're no longer just tracking progress, we're witnessing a breakthrough."
The Women's Super League (WSL) is growing, with the UK league's top two flights deciding in a Monday expansion vote to enlarge its top tier from 12 to 14 teams ahead of the 2026/27 season.
The number of matches played each season will also balloon from 22 to 26 games to accommodate the incoming clubs, as will established cup competitions.
Monday also saw the WSL vote down a prior proposal to temporarily suspend the relegation and promotion process to accommodate this expansion, deciding instead to adopt a "two up, one down" model for the second-tier WSL2 next season.
As such, the top two finishers of the 2025/26 WSL2 season will automatically join the higher-tier WSL, while the WSL's last-place team will battle the WSL2's third-place club in "a high-profile, high stakes match" for the final spot in the top flight.
After reaching 14 teams, both leagues will return to relegating the last-place WSL finisher while promoting the WSL2's top team for the following season.
Along with the increased investment in club infrastructure, a 14-team WSL keeps pace with the global women's game — most notably, the NWSL, which will become a 16-team league in 2026.
"Our priority was to find a route that would benefit the whole women's game pyramid, and we believe this next evolution of women's professional football will raise minimum standards, create distinction, and incentivize investment across the board," said WSL Football CEO Nikki Doucet.
On Tuesday, 2024/25 UEFA Champions League winners Arsenal announced that the Gunners are making the 60,704-capacity Emirates Stadium their permanent home for all WSL matches on the heels of last season's successful nine-game run in the north London venue.
Arsenal dominated the WSL in attendance during their 2024/25 campaign with a total of 415,000 tickets sold, a 20% increase over the Gunners' 2023/24 season.
Even more, the club averaged crowds of over 34,000 fans for the team's nine matches hosted at the men's side's historic Highbury home.
Both Arsenal's and the league's season-high attendance came in February, when 56,784 fans packed Emirates for the Gunners' North London Derby match against Tottenham.
While all of Arsenal's 11 WSL home games will kick off at Emirates, the reigning European champs will open their UWCL defense at the significantly smaller, 4,500-capacity Meadow Park, with future Champions League matches moving to Highbury should the Gunners advance to the tournament's knockout rounds.
"For us, this is just the beginning, and bringing every WSL match to the Emirates is another step for more supporters to be part of this special journey," said Arsenal head coach Renée Slegers in a club statement. "We'll come back next season, with fire in our hearts, more determined, more ambitious, and more together than ever."
Women's teams are big business, with global sports business conference SPOBIS International reporting this week that average WNBA franchise valuations rose to $90 million in 2024, while NWSL clubs weighed in at $104 million — doubling their 2023 mark.
In May, the reigning WNBA champion New York Liberty sold shares at a $450 million valuation, qualifying them as the world's most valuable women's sports team.
SPOBIS's top five includes the WSL's Chelsea FC ($326 million) alongside NWSL side Angel City FC ($250 million), the WNBA's Dallas Wings ($208 million), the Kansas City Current ($182 million), and the Las Vegas Aces ($140 million).
US women's sports teams hold a key advantage in the race to the top of the valuations table, with WNBA and NWSL squads able operate independently from men's systems.
Having separated from their men's side last year, Chelsea FC was the only non-US team to make the list, bolstered by Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian's $26.6 million purchase of a 10% stake in the 2024/25 WSL champs last month.
Other European teams in line for similar value boosts include OL Lyonnes and the London City Lionesses, both independently owned and operated by Washington Spirit owner Michele Kang.
With many factors contributing to a team's overall value — namely capital, media deals, viewership, ownership structures, and popularity — it's tough to predict the next big thing in women's sports, but these numbers point to a red-hot market across major pro leagues.
Adding to their already historic season, 2024/25 WSL champions and 2025 League Cup winners Chelsea FC handed Manchester United a 3-0 defeat in Sunday's 2025 FA Cup final, completing the club's second-ever domestic treble.
Though the Blues first claimed an elusive treble in the 2020/21 season, this year's roster did so without dropping a single match in any of the three domestic competitions.
"I could not have expected this," said first-year Chelsea manager Sonia Bompastor about her debut success leading the Blues. "It is almost ideal in terms of domestic dominance."
To clinch that dominance, Chelsea upended the defending FA Cup champs Manchester United at London's iconic Wembley Stadium behind a brace from French fullback Sandy Baltimore and a header from USWNT attacker Catarina Macario.
Baltimore gave Chelsea the lead by slipping a late first-half penalty past 2024/25 WSL Golden Glove winner and USWNT goalkeeper prospect Phallon Tullis-Joyce, and the Blues never relented, with second-half sub Macario doubling their scoreline in the 84th minute before Baltimore tacked on a final goal in stoppage time.
"It's a very emotional day," an emotional Macario told the broadcast after finishing her first season following a long ACL recovery. "It's a trophy we always wanted to win."
"All the credit to my players," said Bompastor. "We showed our mentality and our values in this game so we ended the season in an almost perfect scenario – we won, we were playing at Wembley, the stadium was nearly sold out, and we had a strong performance and result against a strong opponent."
"It is an almost ideal way to finish the season."
FA Cup crowds prove sustained demand for women's soccer
Chelsea FC's undefeated treble-winning season wasn't the only notable victory on Sunday, as the FA Cup final drew a crowd of over 74,000 fans for the third straight year.
Sunday's 74,412 attendance mark was just shy of both last year's crowd of 76,082 and the 77,390 fans who watched Chelsea defeat the Red Devils in 2023 — all well beyond the tournament final's previous record of 49,094 attendees achieved in 2022.
Fueled by the football fervor following England's 2022 Euro victory — the country's first international trophy, men's or women's, since the 1966 men's World Cup — the 2023 FA Cup final still stands as the largest crowd at a domestic women's soccer match across all nations.
With Sunday's match joining the over-74,000 attendance club, it's clear the post-Euros enthusiasm wasn't a blip, but a boost to the continued growth and sustained success of the women's game.
Following a dominant 2024/25 campaign, Chelsea FC will look to cap their historic run by completing a domestic treble on Sunday, when they'll battle Manchester United for a third season trophy in the 2025 FA Cup final.
After securing the 2024/25 League Cup in March amidst an unbeaten run to a sixth-straight WSL title, the Blues will close out their season against the league's third-place finishers, the Red Devils, in London's iconic Wembley Stadium.
Should Chelsea secure the 2025 FA Cup, they will add a second domestic treble to their resume after clinching their first trio of trophies in the 2020/21 season. This time, however, they could do so in undefeated fashion.
"We are in a really good place, just the fact that we won the league being unbeaten," said first-year Blues manager Sonia Bompastor. "To end the season with an FA Cup final at Wembley against Man United is maybe the perfect way to end the season."
Manchester United hunts second straight FA Cup trophy
Standing between Chelsea and the treble are 2024 FA Cup champions Manchester United, who will take aim at their only trophy of the season partly behind the play of 2024/25 WSL Golden Glove winner and USWNT goalkeeper prospect Phallon Tullis-Joyce.
Man United enter as the game's undisputed underdogs, having dropped both their WSL regular-season matches against Chelsea in narrow 1-0 defeats.
Even more, the Red Devils must overcome a particular tough stretch of play, facing more than a month without a victory on their schedule.
Man United's last win was their 2-0 FA Cup semifinal victory over Manchester City on April 13th, with the Red Devils suffering a pair of losses and recording two draws to close out WSL play.
That said, United has experience downing the Blues on the FA Cup stage, ousting Chelsea from last year's semifinals en route to a club-first FA title.
Remarking that Manchester United "are a really strong team," Bompastor pointed out that the Red Devils "don't concede a lot of goals, and we need to remember that."
"You only get the trophy if you win, so we need to make sure going into the game we have the best preparation and we perform on the day."
How to watch Chelsea play Manchester United at the FA Cup final
The 2025 FA Cup final between Chelsea FC and Manchester United will kick off at 8:30 AM ET on Sunday.
Live coverage of the match will begin at 8:20 AM ET on ESPN+.
Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian is Chelsea FC's newest owner, with the husband of tennis icon Serena Williams reportedly dropping £20 million ($26.6 million) on a 10% stake in the WSL champions earlier this week.
Ohanian is no stranger to investing in women's sports, from launching Angel City as the 2022 NWSL expansion club's majority owner to last year's founding of Athlos NYC, an annual women's track and field event with a $663,000 purse.
"I've bet big on women's sports before — and I'm doing it again," Ohanian posted on social media on Wednesday. "I'm proud to announce that I'm joining @ChelseaFCW as an investor and board member. I'm honored for the chance to help this iconic club become America's favorite @BarclaysWSL team and much, much more."
"These players are rewriting the game. Undefeated season. Eyes on the treble," said Ohanian about Chelsea FC's historic 2024/25 success. "But this isn't just about winning titles. It's about finally matching their talent with the resources, visibility, and respect they deserve."
Ohanian's investment comes amid soaring valuations for women's pro teams — with Chelsea's $257 million price tag ranking as the highest in all of women's soccer.
Calling Ohanian's buy-in "game-changing," Blues manager Sonia Bompastor told reporters on Thursday that "It's really important for the women's game but also for England to have someone to invest in a team like Chelsea."
"We want to be the leaders," she continued. "We want to be the team who shows to every other team how you need to perform and how you need to invest in the women's game."
Women's clubs still successful after splitting with men's teams
Ohanian's investment also indicates Chelsea's commitment to further distancing their women's team operations from their men's side, following last June's ownership move to place the women's squad under an independent subsidiary.
Though most European women's teams remain closely affiliated with their men's counterparts, severing ties is on the rise, with US billionaire Michele Kang assuming majority ownership over women's clubs Olympique Lyonnais and the newly promoted London City Lionesses in recent years.
With skyrocketing revenue — plus Kang's fleet proving that independence benefits women's teams — expect to see even more US investors eyeing women's sports opportunities abroad.
Just two days after wrapping the 2024/25 Women's Super League (WSL) season on Saturday, the UK women's soccer pyramid scored a full rebrand, with new names and visual identities announced for England's first- and second-tier leagues on Monday.
While the WSL will retain its name, the second-flight Women's Championship will become the WSL2 beginning with the 2025/26 season, bringing both top leagues under the same naming umbrella.
The Women's Professional League Limited — the independent company that took over running the WSL and Women's Championship in August 2024 — is also undergoing a name change, becoming simply WSL Football.
Following a development process with creative agency Anomaly, new visual branding "born from the movement of female footballers" has also rolled out across the leagues, with the WSL adopting an orange colorway while the newly named WSL2 will use a magenta palette.
"As a long-time football fan, having the chance to create the future of women's football is the absolute brief of dreams and a career highlight," said Clara Mulligan, Anomaly's managing parter and head of design.
Along with a new WSL Football website, this summer will see the updated designs from the rebrand incorporated across league merchandise, venues, jerseys, soccer balls, and more before the 2025/26 season kicks off.
"There is a lot more in store over the coming months as we continue to grow the women's game for the future," noted WSL Football chief marketing officer Ruth Hooper.
Chelsea FC is the first team in Women's Super League (WSL) history to claim an unbeaten 22-game season, adding the undefeated moniker to their sixth-straight league title with Saturday's 1-0 win over Liverpool.
The Blues' perfect season joins the previous unbeaten campaigns of 2012's Arsenal, 2016's Manchester City, and Chelsea's own 2018 squad — though those three teams did so in 14, 16, and 18 games, respectively.
Chelsea finishes the 2024/25 campaign with an astounding 19 wins and three draws, missing just six possible points on the table en route to their new WSL record of 60 points in a single season.
"As a manager, players, and staff, you only live these moments maybe once in your life," said Chelsea head coach Sonia Bompastor following Saturday's history-making win. "You need to enjoy it because it is a great achievement."
Trailing Chelsea's impressive winning tally by a full 12 points, Arsenal secured second place with a 4-3 victory over third-place Manchester United in their Saturday season finale.
WSL standouts secure individual 2024/25 awards
Though they missed the WSL's team trophy, the Gunners did claim some individual hardware this weekend, as voters selected midfielder Mariona Caldentey as the inaugural winner of the WSL Player of the Season award.
The 29-year-old Spain international led the league in shot creation, and put up nine goals and five assists on the WSL stat sheet this season.
Caldentey's teammate Alessia Russo also walked away with a trophy, sharing the Golden Boot with fourth-place Manchester City's Khadija "Bunny" Shaw after both forwards scored 12 goals each on the season.
Also sharing a stat-sheet title is Chelsea's Hannah Hampton and Manchester United's Phallon Tullis-Joyce, who claimed the 2024/25 WSL Golden Glove award behind 13 clean sheets apiece.
Meanwhile, the season's WSL Rising Star award went to ninth-place West Ham striker Shekiera Martinez. After spending the first half of the 2024/25 season on loan to Bundesliga side SC Freiburg, the 23-year-old German international notched an astounding 10 goals in her 12 total WSL matches.
Speaking of impressive scoring, Manchester City forward Vivianne Miedema's stellar chip against Aston Villa in January earned the Dutch star the 2024/25 WSL Goal of the Season title.